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Hey, readers! The earth needs you! And what a great way to help the environment by riding your bike to work, to school, to the gym, the grocery store, or where ever your heart desires. Maneuvering your way thru traffic might be a nightmare at first, but it is good lesson in getting along with others. If you don’t have a bike, try borrowing one from a friend for one day and see how much faster it is getting around the congested city streets during rush hour. And if you are reluctant to bike to work because you are worried about arriving to work sweaty, don’t worry, the solution is found in a package of handy wipes. The first time you try biking to work you probably will notice a change in your mood upon arriving to work-you will probably arrive happy–as bicycling alleviates stress and releases endorphins (imagine that!). And if you look around the office at your coworkers on the day you bike to work, you will also notice that you are more relaxed, refreshed and productive than they are. The pleasure and satisfaction attained from riding to work might convince you to make cycling your preferred mode of transportation.

For many reasons, the bicycle is the vehicle of the future. It definitely has a competitive edge over driving a car or riding the bus: it’s efficient, it’s economical, and it’s healthy and, most importantly, it’s plain old fun. Also the bicycle is the simplest and most pleasure inducing way to get healthier while saving our environment and reconnecting with the community. The more we bicycle, the smaller our carbon footprint. Autos are the single largest source of us air pollution. Statistics show short trips are up to three times more polluting per mile than long trips. Moreover, choosing to bike to work or to the store will slash your fuel expenses. It also saves you on parking fees, parking tickets, auto insurance, auto maintenance costs, and transit fares. The physical side effects are also a big positive, as it enhances your overall fitness, minimizes your risk of coronary heart disease and helps build stamina. The best thing is it helps you look great –just a few miles of cycling per day assure trimmer and toned muscle. What better time than National bike month to start biking and start a new way of life. Here at the Brod Law Firm, we think everyone should give cycling a try, especially here in San Francisco. With all cutbacks to public transportation and the budget problems MUNI facing, public transportation riders might have to start rethinking how they get around. The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is the best place to go to learn about navigating your way through in the city. They offer classes and other tools that will help you minimize your risk of being involving in an injury accident.

Deciding to place a family member in a nursing home is painful and difficult. Some families, however, have no other choice when the medical and physical demands make other options impossible. Choosing the right and appropriate home is not a task to be taken lightly. Families should make an appointment to tour each home in which they are interested. During each tour you should ask to see more than the public areas and visit several residents’ rooms. And, if possible, families should try to walk through the facility on their own, which will allow them this to experience it without input from staff or the managing director, who may have a one-sided or biased interpretation. Also you should ask if you can join the residents for lunch or dinner.

When families talk to the residents, they should ask them what they like most – and what they feel could be improved. The most important things to look into when talking with residents-things that will help you be the judge if a nursing home is appropriate for your loved one– are those that have to do with quality of life. What does “quality of life” in a nursing home mean? It means that each resident is entititled to things such as, receive care in a manner and in an environment that promotes dignity and respect; organize with other residents to discuss issues of common interest and concern; receive services that recognizes any residents’ special needs, such as food choices or accessability requirements; a program of activities that meets the residents interests, physical, mental and social abilities; and the opportunity to participate in social, religious, and community activities of their choice. All of the above lifestyle choices seem common sense, and, as a consquence, they are often overlooked by families.

Once you find a place that is suitable, it is also important to keep a diary of the events regarding the care of a family member. Sometimes there is lack of oversight in nursing homes regarding the training of nurses, as some nursing homes fail to perform background checks on temp nurses or have on staff nurses whose licenses were suspended–so families should be sure to find out that their loved one is receiving care from liscened professionals. Also, learning the name of the director of nursing, the medical director, and the times they are in the building is very important. Here at the Brod Law Firm, we believe there is no substitute for visting and seeing for yourself if a particular nursing home is acceptable. For we have heard many horror stories from families about relatives that were neglected or abused due to lack of oversight.

Federal regulations require that each resident of a nursing home receive the necessary care and services to attain or maintain physical and mental health. Residents who are unable to independently carry out daily activities, such as grooming and eating, are entitled to receive the highest level of services needed to maintain good nutrition and personal hygiene. Also, it is required that nursing home facilities provide each resident with a nourishing, well-balanced diet that meets the special dietary needs of each resident. Therefore, nursing homes must employ qualified dietitians and sufficient support staff and provide assistive devices and special eating equipment for residents who need them. Failure of a nursing home facility to follow dietary regulations can result in serious injuries of residents, due to dehydration and malnutrition-both of which are preventable.

Since patients are often dependent on staff members to provide them with water and food, they are especially vulnerable to dehydration and malnutrition. Malnutrition can lead to confusion, muscles weakness, bacterial and viral infections and even death. To ensure the overall health of residents is maintained, a nursing home must also maintain medically trained staff. Federal nursing home regulations state that a facility must have 24 hour licensed nursing services and a registered professional nurse for at least 8 consecutive hours every day (under some circumstances there can be waivers of these requirements as long as it does not endanger the health or safety of the residents). When nursing homes fail to maintain adequate levels of staffing, residents are sometimes neglected or abused by overworked, stressed-out staff members.

Here at the Brod Law Firm, we are sometimes asked why nursing home abuse occurs. The following are typical reasons. Low wages and large numbers of residents assigned to each staff member lead to high turnover rates, which leads to mismanaged care. It is often the case that knowledge of the specific needs of residents is lost with high turnover rates, as there is little time for each new trainee to get to know their residents. As result, new trainees feel overworked and unable to meet the needs of residents, then stay a short time and quit. And the cycle goes on and on. Sadly, this happens because most of the nursing home industry is for-profit. As such, these corporations, in order to increase their net profits, try to keep their staffing costs low and hire fewer staff members than is required. So, when staff members place food in front of residents who can’t feed themselves and then don’t bother to assist them, it is essentially the same as starving them.

Growing old in America is not what it was, let’s say, 100 years ago. It used to be the case that age was venerated in society. Today, however, there is a negative perception associated with aging that is fostered by our culture. For the most part, the experience of the elderly is discounted by the media, or it is not represented at all–very definitely, youth and prestige have gained superiority over experience. Age has diminished as a distinguishing element among the elderly as it pertains to their worth. Without argument, the message in society today is this: to be worthwhile, you must be young. Consequently, as the negative image associated with aging is continually perpetuated throughout society, it leaves the elderly with a sense that they are worthless. Sadly for some elderly, the feeling of worthlessness is compounded when they are placed in a nursing home, especially if it is not a well functioning one. Without proper care at nursing home, the elderly commonly suffer from what we consider “nursing home abuse.”

Medicare and Medicaid have had a large impact on the use of nursing homes and the changes in patterns of financing have encouraged the construction of nursing homes. Despite Medicare and Medicaid funding and laws created to protect the elderly, there are few safeguards to ensure that a standard of patient care is maintained. Countless nursing home studies have found that proper staffing is one of the main factors to a well functioning nursing home. Investigators usually find that understaffing leads to verbal abuse and neglect. When nursing homes cut staff, pay lower wages or let caregiver levels slip below a state mandated minimum, the residents suffer. State inspectors continually undercover a litany of violations, such as neglecting bedsores and giving patients the wrong drugs. There is an implicit good faith agreement between staff and residents that they will receive proper care. Yet some nursing homes house, as part of their business plan, a high percentage medically fragile patients in order to receive higher reimbursements–which is dangerous when combined lower staffing rates.

A common injury due to understaffed nursing homes is the development of pressure sores–a telltale sign of neglect. Some patients, especially diabetics or those with high blood pressure, can develop pressure sores on ankles and tailbone. Sores can become so deep to the point that bone becomes exposed and then becomes severely infected. When a bed sore develops, nursing home staff must be quick to identify the wound and implement the use of medical equipment, such as pressure relieving mattresses and heel protectors, to prevent the wounds from worsening. When bed sore are not treated in their initial stage, they progress and become difficult and more costly to treat. A stage 3 or 4 bed sore typically requires aggressive medical treatment. In some cases, though, by the time significant medical treatment his utilized, many patients are already suffering from serious complications. In the most extreme cases, gangrene can set in and a patient has to have their leg amputated. And the worst cases of all are those that result in the death of a patient.

Here is a scenario that may or may not sound familiar to you: A financial advisor meets with an elderly client (maybe your mother or father or some other elderly person you care about) and encourages that client to exchange their fixed annuity for a variable annuity. Then, some years later, that same financial advisor, persuades their client to annuitize the policy, thereby causing the client to lose a substantial amount of money. This type of act is a violation of fiduciary duty and California’s elder abuse statue, which makes it illegal to wrongfully obtain and use an elder’s property. Under California’s Elder Abuse and Dependent Adult Civil Protection act, it is stated that “financial abuse” occurs when a person or entity “takes, appropriates, or retains real or personal property of an elder or dependent adult to a wrongful use or with intent to defraud, or both.” “Wrongful use” occurs when any of the above mentioned actions is taken “in bad faith.” “Bad Faith” is shown when a person or entity should have known that the elder or dependent adult had the right to have the property transferred or made readily available to the elder or dependent adult or to his or her representative. Basically, bottom line is, an elder abuse claim is warranted when a financial advisor does not inquire enough about their client to determine that an exchange of an existing fixed annuity for a variable annuity is in their best interest.

These ‘unsavory’ marketing practices by insurers or other deceptive practices in connection with the sale of annuities to senior citizens are a common type of elder abuse. The following are some “red flag ” type situations to consider if an elderly person you care about is going to meet with or has already met with a financial advisor regarding annuities:

• Sometimes the damages arising from rolling over a fixed annuity into a variable annuity, rather than liquidating the annuity can often be substantial.

According to the Associated Press, a total of 89 class action lawsuits have been filed against Toyota nationwide as of Monday, which could result in 3billion in payouts (if each individual receives around $500). Speaking of Class Action Lawsuits, have you ever received a notice in the mail from the courts that you are a member of a class action lawsuit and wondered what the heck it means? Then, not knowing what was the best thing to do or what you really could gain or lose from taking action, thrown the notice in the garbage? Here at the Brod Law Firm, we believe in the class action suit, as they give the everyday, hardworking citizens a chance to fight large corporations and private entities. So, with that said, we would like to give a brief tutorial about class actions for our readers, for the next time they might receive notice from the courts or have a potential class action claim of their own.

Let’s say you buy a car with faulty brakes and contact the company who makes the car, asking them what they will do to fix the problem. Then they delay or avoid taking responsibility for the issue, leaving you frustrated enough to hire an attorney. At that point your attorney will do some research and file a lawsuit on your behalf, and any other parties involved, and the company is put on notice. Then your attorney takes some depostions and asks the court to certify the case as a class action, meaning all people in the same circumstance get redress. Next, the court directs that notice be given to all parties having a similar claim during a particular time period. Those parties are then to be notified (usually by the defendants’ attorney) so that they may be informed and have input into the case. At that time, all parties, including the persons who bring the claim, are treated equally.

So basically, what a class action does is it allows cases that have merit to be filed that would otherwise be too expensive to litigate had they been filed individually. In the course of a class action case, several notices are mailed to class members, giving them a chance to “opt-out”. If they choose to “opt-out”, they have no further standing in the case. They can forget the matter or bring about file an action on their own behalf. If a party does not “opt-out,” they are considered to be a party to the case. From that point on you are bound by court’s decision and prohibited from taking any further action in the matter. The case could settle quickly or take years. Then, at the end, the parties will either reach an agreement, and the judge will approve the fairness and propriety of the settlement, or the case is tried and the judge renders a decision.

Did you ever go shop for something at a store that guaranteed a rebate, say at a electronic or office supply store? A lot of consumers love rebates, but few know the exact meaning of rebate or how it works. “Rebate” means the return of a payment or a partial payment, which serves as a discount or reduction in price. They are also called promos, offers, deals, or rebates, calling on the customers to buy a product or service right now. Depending on the particular type of promotion, the customer receives a rebate check or a rebate card back by mail, also called MIRs or mail-in rebates. The rebate process is not a straight forward process. How it works is manufacturers, service providers, and retailers or E-tailers, who fund the rebates, hire third-party fulfillment companies; also known as fulfillment houses, fulfillment services providers, FSPs or rebated processors; to process the request for the customers who, sometimes, wait long periods for receipt of their rebates. So what motivates companies to offer rebates, anyway?

When companies offer a rebate in place of immediate discounts on a certain product, they increase the odds of that product being purchased. But often, filling out the receipts and putting together the collection of paperwork and proofs-of-purchase required to redeem them can be frustrating, especially if you are not a very organized, meticulous person who saves all your receipts. Also some buyers simply forget or can’t be bothered to go through the hassle of trying to get $10 back or follow instructions correctly. Companies seem to bank on consumers not being organized, forgetful or careless. Added to that is the fact that, sometimes, even when a consumer properly follows instructions, the rebate never arrives, leaving the consumer feeling they have been scammed. When a consumer does not receive their rebate, it can translate into millions of extra revenue for retailers and their suppliers each year. And, sometimes, when the check does arrive, it gets thrown in the trash because it looks like junk mail. Bottom line: What rebates do is get consumers to focus on the discounted price of a product, then buy it at full price.

But many consumers, including state and federal authorities, such as the Federal Trade Commission, suspect that companies design the rules to keep redemption rates low. Manufacturers and retail stores make good use of this phenomenon, as they know most consumers won’t put up a fight or spend money to hire an attorney to help them get back a 50 dollar rebate that they never received– it would cost 10 times that amount to pay the bill of even the cheapest of attorneys. When a company offers a rebate and then does not follow through, that is what we call “rebate fraud“. Here at the Brod Law Firm, we are ready to help victims of fraudulent business practices recover what is owed to them. Additionally, we have listed some ways to avoid being a victim of rebate fraud:

Last week Mayor Gavin Newsom submitted a new piece of legislation to the Board of Supervisors: a citywide ban on sitting or lying on public sidewalks, including in front of your house. He introduced the legislation in response to the harassment of pedestrians and merchants by street persons, especially the harassing that takes place in the Haight on a daily basis. Similar ordinances are in effect in other cities, including Santa Cruz, Seattle, Wash., and Austin, Texas. The legislation consists of the following:

• No sitting or lying on sidewalks from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. daily

• Dogs cannot be more than 2 feet away from owner when stationary

Last week a lawsuit filed by the Bologna family, the family whose father and two sons were fatally shot in 2008, against the city of San Francisco was thrown out. The presiding judge, Charlotte Woolard, ruled that the surviving members of the Bologna family can’t sue the city for allegedly harboring accused murderer Edwin Ramos from federal immigration authorities under federal immigration laws. In her ruling she stated: “In California and in their jurisdictions, it is well established that public entities generally are not liable for failing to protect individuals against crime.” Unlike injury cases where public entities and local jurisdiction can be held liable for injuries suffered at those locations, criminal cases do not follow the same rule. The lawsuit also claimed that that Ramos, an alleged illegal immigrant, had been previously arrested multiple times for violence and drug offenses, and the city failed to notify immigration enforcement. It is interesting to note that the Bologna family had also filed suit in federal court in 2008, and that that suit was also dismissed last year after a U.S. district judge reached the same conclusion. The crime and the criminal’s immigration status are two separate issues (issues that are too complex for the purposes of this blog), the former having no bearing on the latter.

Here at the Brod law firm, complex and tragic cases like this always leave us pondering the nature of justice, really. After all the lawsuits are filed, who is the last person to blame? Of course the person with the gun is the one responsible, but often the families of victims, such as this case shows, believe more than one person be held responsible–which is completely understandable– in the face of the facts. It is hard to fathom the depth of grief any family feels after such a monstrous crime. Obviously, the family in this case has to come to terms with the result of the lawsuit; but, more importantly, they must come to terms with the deaths of their family members. We have seen our own clients face similar challenges during wrongful death lawsuits. Clients sometimes alienate themselves behind a lawsuit, thereby making it harder to accept and deal with their loss. It is an arduous task coming to terms with death of a loved one; it requires a courageous act of allowing the full measure of grief to penetrate one’s faculties and then by adjusting one’s life accordingly. Let’s be clear, in no way do we claim to be experts on the subject of grieving. Consequently, we always recommend victims’ families to seek out the appropriate form of grief counseling.

Poor MUNI. It seems MUNI just can’t get a break these days. Our wonderful city’s transit system is being buried alive under a huge deficit, and its riders are going down with it. Anyone concerned about the current proposed MUNI service cuts and fare increases should attend the SFMTA meeting on Friday February 26 in Room 400 at City Hall at 9am. These are hard times for MUNI, as their budget is out of control, there has already been a ton of service cuts, people are just starting to get used to paying more for their fast passes, and violence on buses and bus crashes continue. So it is imperative that MUNI riders speak up regarding issues that pertain to their safety and financial well-being during this Friday’s morning meeting. There you can offer your ideas on how MUNI can balance its budget.

There is no doubt that the most significant factor in the agency’s recent budget crises is the state’s cut of transit funds-the MTA has lost $179.1 million in State Transit Assistance funding over the past three fiscal years. Now, the MTA is proposing more service cuts to Muni in order to close a $16.9 million projected budget gap through the end of the fiscal year. The cuts are as bad as the ones introduced in December, and, if approved, are scheduled to go into effect in May. Some of the changes include reducing frequencies on every Muni line; increasing fares on services including the F-line, express routes, and cable cars; and charging MTA employees for parking. The major factors affecting the deficit are:

• the projected increases in the cost of benefits including health, retirement, and other benefits, which add up to about $37 million over two years;